A Brief Visit to Crater Lake

Friday after work we packed up and headed two hours south to Crater Lake. Our destination was a national forest campground on the shores of Diamond Lake. We had heard from numerous other travelers that Diamond Lake Campground is the best place to stay in the area because it’s only a 10 minutes drive from the entrance to Crater Lake. It’s also a huge campground with around 250 sites. I would estimate that roughly half of them are right on the water. As we arrived night was falling so we only drove through a few loops before finding a suitable spot. I bet this place is very popular in the middle of the summer making it hard to snag a lakeside spot on a Friday evening. That was soo not the case on this Friday evening. There were only a few other brave souls crazy enough to camp in the very chilly, very wet, weather and we had many sites to choose from. As soon as we pulled in and unhooked we ran inside and turned on the furnace, which meant we didn’t see much of our site until the next morning. Here we are in site M11.

It rained pretty much all night on Friday, but had stopped by the morning. We waited around a bit Saturday morning hoping that maybe by some miracle the sun would break through the clouds. By noon there was still no sign of the sun, so we bundled up and headed down the road to Crater Lake. The first thing we encountered in the park before reaching the lake was the Pumice Desert. This large barren expanse of land is filled with a layer of pumice that reaches 200 feet deep. The pumice is left over matter from when Mt. Mazma erupted nearly 8,000 years ago. Pretty cool right?

The next thing we encountered was snow. Lots of snow.

We stopped at picnic area so Phineas could have a little fun in the white stuff.

As we drove the road around the rim of the lake we stopped at several different pull-offs to take in the view. All summer we’ve been enjoying photos from other travelers of this oh-so-blue lake with a perfect blue sky background. While it was disappointing that we all we got was clouds and more clouds, the lake was still really, really stunning. Here’s a few photos from the different pull-offs. These are all from the west side of the lake because the east rim road was closed due to snow.

When we got home from the lake it started raining again- and never stopped. As I write this it’s mid-morning on Sunday and has been raining for more than 16 hours now. Guess the bike ride that we planned around Diamond Lake will not be happening. In an hour or so we will be packing up and heading south to California in search of some sun and hopefully warmer temperatures. Until then this is our view of the lake.

1 comment

So glad you got to stay at Diamond Lake! How about that snow….!!! My goodness. We’re seeing some weird storms out here on the coast too. Should make for interesting driving. Will see what the weather is like once we get to 395. If it’s still warm’ish we’ll stay around Mammoth Lakes…if too cold we’ll move on down to Bishop.

About The Watsons

This is the story of Tim & Amanda. Since 2012, we have traveled the U.S. while living and working from our renovated 25-foot Airstream. Follow us on our crazy journey in search of beautiful scenery, fun adventures, interesting people, tasty foods, and more…